The Latest: Determining cause of power outage may take days

SEATTLE – The Latest on a power outage affecting downtown Seattle (all times local):

3 p.m.

A Seattle utility spokesman says it might take days to determine the cause of an hour-long power outage on Wednesday.

Seattle City Light spokesman Tyson Lin says the outage impacted about 60 per cent of downtown Seattle. Lin says no injuries were reported but the Seattle Fire Department had to perform 24 elevator rescues.

A fire spokeswoman told The Associated Press that in each case, fire crews determined the floor that the elevator was stuck and used a special key to open the doors and let the trapped people out. Many people reported walking down dozens of floors to reach the ground.

Lin says they have a team that is analyzing what took place. He says they’re reviewing all possible causes.

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12:45 p.m.

Authorities say power has been restored to downtown Seattle after an outage darkened much of the area, causing traffic lights to fail and disrupting light rail service.

Seattle City Light says power was restored about 12:30 p.m. after being down for about an hour. Crews were still investigating the cause and an exact estimate on the number of customers affected wasn’t immediately available. Earlier the utility said an equipment failure at a substation was to blame.

People who were riding in elevators when the power went out were stranded and put out calls for help, according to the Seattle online dispatch page. About 25 calls for elevator rescues were reported around town.

Seattle’s airport did not lose power, but some landline phones were down, according to a Tweet by Sea-Tac Airport.

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12:21 p.m.

A Seattle utility spokesman says an equipment failure at a substation has darkened much of Seattle’s downtown core.

Seattle City Light spokesman Tony White says a large power outage that began around 11:30 a.m. has left thousands of people without power.

He says it’s unclear yet how many buildings are affected by the power outage. Traffic signals through downtown are also not functioning.

Crews expect to restore power within a couple of hours.

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